About This Poem

“Across two vast, golden landscapes, that of the Kansas Tallgrass Prairie, and that of the Mojave Desert (where any form of human presence feels like an invasion itself) the poem’s title is a reference to the invasive tamarisk tree, which drips with dense masses of pink flowers, even as it threatens the delicate ecology of the area with its terrible alien thirst.”—Louise Mathias

More by Louise Mathias

All night I flew the dark recess of God's mind.
It was arranged like Iowa fields--
not a damn thing missing.
You ask how I survived.
I lived on a message, broad light
at the end of the world.
Words, they have so much in common with departure,
the clouds elliptical & nervous.
Why translate? It's just a revolving door.
"Chill wind" has seven
components. One is loss.

And how to fill them
is the problem of cigarettes and paint.
First time I felt my undoing
was in front of
a painting—Sam Francis, I believe.
Oh, his bloomed out, Xanax-ed California.
I liked the word guard, but you know
we made each other
nervous, standing too close
for everyone concerned. All art being
a form of violence
as a peony
is violence.
Here you come
with your open hands.